Joy of Composting

We waited for the dew to burn off the rain-soaked lawn before firing up the lawn mower. The grass was tall, which meant we had to rake. That's usually my job, but since surgery on my shoulder a month ago, keeping GB hydrated with bottle after bottle of water has been my main contribution. Today I was able to rake up about a third of the mown grass and haul it to the compost pile.

It must have been about 25 years ago when I first learned about composting. I was living in the country at the time, and the idea of turning kitchen scrapes into soil sounded almost too good to be true. So I found a good spot not too far from the back kitchen door and eagerly set about collecting potato peels, egg shells, coffee grounds and anything else tiny microbes could turn into dirt, added it to the pile and waited hopefully for the miracle. Things weren't moving along fast enough so I took a bucket to my grandpa's chicken house and hauled back chicken poop to speed things along. Several years worth of kitchen refuse, chicken poop, and a little ash from my grandparent's fireplace never created enough compost to spread on even the smallest flower bed. That most of the carrots, apples and such were fed to the goats and the lone donkey in the pasture across the fence were contributing factors no doubt.

I've been a compulsive composter ever since. Just give me a little spot of ground, and soon it has a growing pile of broccoli stems, melon rinds and used tea bags, although I haven't come across chicken poop since I left the country. Sadly, none of my subsequent piles have fared any better than the first -- until I moved to Hasty Street.
Check this beauty out. You're looking at almost six years of the usual kitchen scrapes plus grass clippings and the carcasses of countless zinnias, watermelon, sweet potato and hyacinth vines, and any other plant that died or was pulled up at the end of its season. This summer I put some of my homegrown compost on zinnia beds and in azalea pots. Is that exciting or what?!

So today I raked grass, took a shovel and turned it into the pile rich with dirt, apple cores, corn husks, and a small garden snake. Hard sweaty work followed by an ice pack on the recovering shoulder. That's okay. Today's sweat and blistered fingers will be forgotten when I dig my hands into the dark rich soil of my own creation tomorrow.